Nick Carpenter: 1969-2020

News / 18 Jan 2021

Simon Dowson has paid tribute to his Delta Motorsport co-founder Nick Carpenter who sadly passed away shortly before Christmas after battle with cancer.

Simon and Nick formed Delta in 2005, before then locating to Silverstone Park in 2007.

Together, they then built the business into one of the premier names in high powered battery design and technology in the UK.

Delta recently expanded on site to a third industrial property and it now employs over 45 people. Its technologies are used in an increasing number of advanced engineering sectors, including automotive, aviation, defence, marine and motorsport.

However, it wasn’t a battery technology project that got them started at Silverstone Park, as Simon recalled.

“We were asked to design and build in just five months all 15 cars for the new Grand Prix Masters race series with past F1 legends like Nigel Mansell and Emmerson Fittipaldi in it. The first race was at Kyalami in South Africa. Talk about in at the deep end. But we did it!

“Nick and I had first met one another when we both worked at Reynard in the mid to late-90s. We worked closely on an engineering project and realised our skills complimented one another.

“He then left for Piper Design in London and later called me to get involved for a bit. Then in about 2005 we set up Delta, initially in a property owned by my father (famed race car engineer and team boss Roger Dowson) on the other side of the Dadford Road and got going from there before moving across to Silverstone Park.”

Simon is rightly proud of the reputation he and Nick have built for Delta in the past 15 or so years and also seeing the business expand and provide skilled engineers with employment.

“He was a highly talented engineer who took time to understand all the elements of what we were getting involved with… Anyone who’s been with us for some time would have spent a lot of time working with Nick going through projects.

“He’ll leave a lasting legacy; his work in particular in the low carbon sector has been really prolific, working with Innovate UK and other bodies. He really championed that cause. Plus, anyone who ever met Nick knows just how much of a thoroughly decent person he was. I don’t think he ever made an enemy”

Whilst Nick’s passing – he leaves a wife and two sons – has been felt by all at Delta and the wider engineering community, the manner in which he and Simon worked to structure the business behind the scenes mean it is in good hands for many years to come.

Simon continued: “Nick and I spent a number of years more recently building a strong management team and employee base at Delta which ultimately are responsible for the day-to-day running of the business and the delivery of programmes, so as to minimise our impact on business.

“We never wanted it to be reliant solely on me and Nick so the rest of the management team and staff have also taken on that mantle. Fundamentally in terms of business, whilst we’re all affected by the loss of Nick, it will become business as usual.”

Meanwhile please CLICK HERE to make donations to Nick’s chosen charity, the Pancreatic Cancer Research Fund.

Also, Silverstone Park is planning to pay an appropriate tribute to Nick once it is possible to arrange a gathering.